


touch has a memory & mine is you

by elisela



Category: 9-1-1 (TV)
Genre: Getting Together, M/M, Touch-Starved
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-07
Updated: 2020-09-07
Packaged: 2021-03-06 18:44:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,851
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26333587
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elisela/pseuds/elisela
Summary: It starts small—just Buck’s hand wrapping around his wrist to tug him close when a crowd of people at Dodger Stadium nearly separate them as they meet in front of the stadium—but when Buck starts to let go, Eddie swings his arm in closer, presses their bare forearms together. It’s been weeks since they’ve spent time together; another earthquake and dozens of first responders injured across the city meant temporary transfers and shifts being changed from 24-72 to 24-48, and they somehow hadn’t found time for anything other than phone calls and texts for nearly a month.
Relationships: Evan "Buck" Buckley/Eddie Diaz (9-1-1 TV)
Comments: 25
Kudos: 588





	touch has a memory & mine is you

**Author's Note:**

  * For [evanbuckleydiaz](https://archiveofourown.org/users/evanbuckleydiaz/gifts).



> For my beloved Elisa on her birthday.

It starts small—just Buck’s hand wrapping around his wrist to tug him close when a crowd of people at Dodger Stadium nearly separate them as they meet in front of the stadium—but when Buck starts to let go, Eddie swings his arm in closer, presses their bare forearms together. It’s been weeks since they’ve spent time together; another earthquake and dozens of first responders injured across the city meant temporary transfers and shifts being changed from 24-72 to 24-48, and they somehow hadn’t found time for anything other than phone calls and texts for nearly a month. 

“God, I missed you,” Buck says, and when he swings his arm up on Eddie’s shoulders, Eddie can’t help but lean into it. “Everything okay?”

“Yeah,” he says, forcing himself to pull back, embarrassed. “I knew you’d be late, Buck, we’re gonna miss the first pitch.”

Buck makes a noise and pulls him closer. “Yeah, yeah, there’s at least 200 more after that,” he says. 

“That’s—” he wrinkles up his nose, thinking, “seven pitches per batter on average. Kershaw is starting tonight—”

“Eddie,” Buck sighs, “are you seriously trying to lecture me about baseball already? You know I need a beer before you start in on all this.”

Eddie elbows him in retaliation, but Buck still doesn’t move his arm, so Eddie elbows him harder, until he snatches it away and hits Eddie back, the two of them play fighting like children until they get up to the gate and Buck backs away, pulling the tickets out of his pocket, and Eddie misses the heat of his body even though it’s what he had meant to happen.

Eddie had never realized how much Buck touched him until he wasn’t anymore. His new crew at Station 69 (which had made Buck snort milk through his nose when Bobby had given him the— _temporary_ —transfer papers) aren’t a close bunch; they have his number and he’s gotten a few texts on his off hours, but no one is spending their days off with him, sending him pictures of cats available for adoption and whining when he points out how much work an animal is, and certainly no one has shown up at his house unannounced with take-out and a new board game. And they certainly aren’t as touchy as his team; no one squeezes his shoulder as they pass by, knocks their arms together on the way to the truck, or sprawls against his side while they play video games on the couch. They’re perfectly respectful of his personal space, and Eddie fucking hates it.

He makes it three innings before Buck twists in his seat towards him and leans in with an intense look on his face, knee bumping up against Eddie’s. “Okay, tell me what’s going on.”

He raises an eyebrow. “Uh, Betts is on first and Hernandez is up to the plate, but he’s got two strikes and—Buck, seriously, haven’t I taught you enough about baseball for you to be able to follow this?”

Buck looks unimpressed. “I meant with you. You’re—weird.”

“Gee, thanks.”

“You know what I mean,” Buck says. “Is something wrong? Am I making you uncomfortable?”

“You are _now_ ,” he says, looking away. “Let it go. And don’t you _dare_ start singing that song.” Buck huffs out a breath next to him, and when he doesn’t move away, Eddie stands up. “I’m gonna go grab more beers,” he says, ignoring the half-full bottles in the cupholders in front of them, and he flees.

Chris is going through a phase.

At least, that’s what Eddie hopes it is. 

Twelve is apparently too old to be hugged by your dad, to let him give you a kiss goodbye, or goodnight—too old for anything except an occasional bump against the shoulder in the kitchen, or a fist bump a second before he opens the door to the truck to be dropped off at school. 

If Eddie holds his arms out, Chris looks at him flatly. If Eddie follows him to his bedroom door at night to tuck him in, Chris draws his name out through several syllables and declares that he’s not a kid and definitely doesn’t need to be tucked in. If Eddie reaches out a hand to place on his back while they go out to dinner, or to a movie, Chris ducks out of his way and shakes his head.

The touch-aversion is killing Eddie.

In the sixth, Buck’s fingers brush against his as he hands him a plate of nachos.

In the seventh, Seager hits a homerun and his skin buzzes after Buck gives him a high-give, lacing their fingers together briefly before Eddie pulls away.

In the eighth, he squeezes past Eddie to use the bathroom, one hand on Eddie’s waist when Eddie stands to let him through.

After the ninth, he stays in his seat, looking over at Eddie thoughtfully as they wait for the crowd to thin out before leaving. “You gonna talk to me now? No one’s around.”

“There’s nothing to talk about,” he says. There’s not. So what if no one has touched Eddie outside of calls in a month? So what if that sort of contact isn’t enough for him, if he craves the kind of touch Buck has so freely given him over the years? It’s not Buck’s problem that Eddie is touch starved, and he refuses to _make_ it his problem. He just needs a little distance, because every time Buck touches him, it’s all Eddie can do to not plaster himself to Buck and take the comfort he desperately wants. 

Buck groans. “Eds, it’s been a month since we’ve gotten to see each other and if you think I’ve forgotten how to tell when something is wrong, I haven’t. Did I do something? Did we make plans that I forgot about, or—” he reaches out and puts his hand on Eddie’s thigh, and Eddie stands up.

“Come on,” he says, “traffic’s probably died down a little by now.”

It’s not that he doesn’t know what his problem is, or that he hasn’t tried to solve it. He’d tried a massage—extremely uncomfortable once he’d realized that he was basically paying someone to make him feel good and couldn’t get the thought out of his head—gotten an unnecessary haircut, tried a pedicure.

Nothing worked.

He doesn’t want someone to touch him just because _he_ wants it, he wants them to want it, too. He doesn’t want fingers digging into tired ankles, he wants someone’s palm to rest against his skin and stay there, to put down roots and make a home inside him. 

He wants—deperately—Buck. 

It doesn’t surprise him to see the Jeep’s headlights sweep across the front of his house a few minutes after he arrives home; he hadn’t bothered locking the door, knowing that ignoring four of Buck’s phone calls meant that he would surely show up.

But Buck doesn’t come in and make himself at home, just opens the door, leans against the frame with arms crossed over his chest, and says, “why don’t you want me touching you? Why didn’t you just say something? I would have stopped, Eddie.”

Eddie waves him in, but Buck stays stubbornly where he is. “It’s not a big deal,” he says. “Come on, let’s watch something.”

“It’s a big deal to me,” Buck insists. “I made you uncomfortable, and I—I’m really sorry, Eddie. I just—can you tell me why?”

Eddie tilts his head forward and pinches the bridge of his nose; Buck sounds hurt and _small_ , and Eddie knows without a doubt that if he lets him leave feeling like this, they’re going to go weeks without seeing each other again, and the phone calls will drop off, too. He scrubs a hand across his face, takes in a deep breath and says, eyes still focused on the ground in front of him, “I haven’t—no one’s touched me in weeks.”

Buck is silent.

“I thought I might not be able to stop,” he admits. “I just want—” he stops, shakes his head. “It’s pathetic. I’m sorry.”

“Did you know if you hug someone for twenty seconds, it releases oxytocin?” Buck asks, and Eddie hears the front door closing before Buck’s footsteps sound across the floor. “There’s a surprising amount of health benefits,” he says, and Eddie looks up in time to see Buck’s hands reaching for him.

He goes willingly when Buck pulls him up, buries his head in Buck’s shoulder as he wraps his arms around him, and breathes him in. Twenty seconds—that’s new. They’re quick huggers, usually, lingering for a few seconds sometimes, hands on each other's shoulders or waists, but it’s—comforting. Buck is warm against him, and Eddie loses count when he gets to twenty in his head and Buck still doesn’t move except for the rhythmic sweep of fingertips along the back of his neck. He gives in and lets his body melt against Buck’s, lets his fingers creep up into Buck’s hair and run through the soft strands, gives up his dignity entirely and pushes the arm around Buck’s waist underneath the shirt he’s wearing and places his palm against skin. 

“Eddie,” Buck sighs, and a shiver jolts up his spine, and Eddie blames that for the very stupid, very reckless thing he does next: slides his hand further up into Buck’s hair to hold his head still, tilts his own head up, and kisses him. He kisses him like he’s been wandering the desert for days and Buck has handed him water, kisses him like the last bit of air left in the world resides in Buck’s lungs, kisses him like he’s a sinner and Buck is his reconciliation. 

His knees hit the back of the couch and he falls, Buck landing on his lap, and Buck only moves away to say, “this isn’t just because—please tell me this—”

“It’s not,” Eddie says, chasing after Buck’s mouth, “Jesus, you have no idea—”

“Kinda think I do,” Buck says, and he dips down to kiss him again. “Hey Eddie,” he says, hands framing Eddie’s face, thumbs brushing over his skin, “did you know that skin to skin contact reduces the amount of cortisol in your body?”

Eddie can’t stop touching him—hands on his waist, stroking up his back, digging his fingertips into Buck’s biceps as they kiss. He hums, reeling in his desperation, the desire that sings through his frantic heartbeat. “Got any suggestions?”

“I can think of a few,” Buck says, and his fingertips dance along the hemline of Eddie’s shirt. 

Later—hours later—Eddie’s sprawled out on his front, head pillowed on Buck’s shoulder, fingertips counting out the steady beat of Buck’s pulse as Buck sweeps his hand gently up and down Eddie’s back. And he loves it, but—“you don’t have to keep touching me,” he says into Buck’s skin. “Don’t feel like—”

“Do you like it?”

“Yeah,” he says, quietly.

“Then let me keep doing it,” Buck says, pressing a kiss to the top of his head.


End file.
